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I wasn’t going to let her bait me and remained silent.
“He was at a bar with some slut on his lap with his tongue in her mouth. The guy that wanted to marry me not seven days before. I’d heard the rumors he was hooking up with everything that moved, but I didn’t want to believe it.”
I might have been pissed too in that situation, but according to her, they’d broken up.
“That doesn’t excuse sleeping with his best friend. The two of you had broken things off,” I said, defending Grant.
“You have no idea. Love happens unexpectedly. Unapologetically. I didn’t plan for it, and I don’t regret it either. A word of warning: if I were you, I wouldn’t get my hopes up with Grant. He’s a nice guy, but still a guy. He has quite the reputation.”
With that, she got the last word and hopped into her truck. I was left to haul in the groceries. As I was putting them away, something in one of the bags was rank. I barely made it to the bathroom before I lost what was left in my stomach.
As I sat there on the floor after a bout of dry heaving, I came to a decision.
30
Grant
I couldn’t keepthe smile off my face. I’d walked into my dad’s house and caught him with Natalie. I was fucking happy for the old man and ended up doing him a favor so he could spend the morning with her. I went to the airpark and checked things out, which made me late getting back to Jolie.
What I didn’t expect to find was Jolie standing in the middle of the room, her bag at her feet.
When I looked up, I recognized the regret on her face.
“I bought a ticket home,” she announced.
All the sunshine fled the room.
“Did I say anything?” I asked, almost falling to my knees.
Déjà vu was playing games with me. I was frozen in the moment, somewhere between the past and present.
“No. I just need to get home,” she said.
Then it clicked. Cara had been here.
“What did she say?” I asked.
“She confirmed what you told me.”
“She said something else,” I insisted.
“Grant,” she said, stopping me as I moved closer. “This was never going to work.” She checked her wrist. “My flight is in a couple of hours. Will you take me to the airport, or should I get a cab?”
“I’ll take you.”
The icy silence didn’t thaw on the ride over. When I pulled up to the departure gate, I reached for her, but she slipped out of my fingers.
“Thanks for everything,” she said, a tear sliding down her cheek as she closed the doors on us for what had to be forever.
When I pulled away, everything I’d ever wanted was left behind. To add insult to injury, I received a call from Skyland Airlines’ Human Resources Department that I’d been laid off. The virus that plagued the world left airline travel in a chokehold.
The lie we told ourselves when shit hit the fan was we would be fine.
I wasn’t fine. For the first week after Jolie left, as I began marking time, I ended up drinking myself to sleep.
It was sometime during the third week my father showed up.
“Boy, get your shit together,” he said, towering over my prone form on the sofa.
